[Closed] What's the (in your opinion) most pointless bit of bling on your bike...?!

Me

Given my lack of fitness and technical ability, the whole damn bike is too bling

I always spend too much on stems - Ritchey WCS on my road bikes - when the £16.99 Kalloy Uno 7 ones work perfectly fine and are probaly lighter too.

The Spurcycle Chris King Ltd bells…£70 (+import) for a bell!

A topology optimised, 3D printed, PVD coated, aerospace grade titanium 64…………stem top cap.

I used to have sterling silver headset spacer made by a jeweller, for my ETSX and my IndyFab.

Truly, though - almost all of my bikes are unnecessary bling. King cages, Carbon wheels, Chris King XYZ, etc. Why?

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ooh..my bently components ti topcap is a pointless bit of bling too!!!

DrP

The anodized Burgtec fork axle.

In my defence it's actually cheaper than the original Ohlins ones it replaced. Plus it's anodized gold - not that you can see it when the front wheels on the bike, obvs.

My saddle cost more than my dropper post.

In deffence of this, the saddle was bought for the road bike and I found the cutout uncomfortably large but appart from that it's fine. And on the MTB I don't notice it as I'm stood up.

Also I suspect it's probably the same weight as other £300 saddle/dropper combinations, just not usually allocated with a £100 dropper! And logically you'll notice a nice saddle more than a kashima seatpost!

Red deathgrips. Not even the right shade of red.

Carbon bottle cage, for the weight loss and frame material match.

Silver Nokon gear cables,they work no better than boggo standard outers, but I likes em. 😀

Oil slick finish...

🤣 @tomhoward

The whole damn bike!

(2018 Orbea Rallon M-Team. It’s so much better than me but it was cheapish and local when I was looking for my first full-sus)

Mine may be the cane creek anodized DUB preloader

Thanks for the reminder - I've been meaning to add that bit of pointless bling to my bike for ages.

Mine may be the cane creek anodized DUB preloader

That's a great bit of bling. Orange on mine to match the orange cinch bolts (black ones were fine but orange was available).

Portland design works bird bottle cage. Had a cage but it's a bird frame so seemed right 😂.

You know the WHOLE original preloader comes off... need to wedge it out, then it slides off....

DrP

Not the roval carbon wheels because they bring real benefits. Probably the orange hope brakes which have less power than Shimano deore at more than twice the price. They look nice though.

Niner YAWYD top caps that hold a bottle cap on my commuter bike. Think it cost about £15, NO functional difference from the plain alloy one it came with.

Brooks Cambrium saddle on my MTB, rock hard rubber that will never break in like a leather Brooks. Uncomfortable and expensive, but looks ace.

Are we allowed previous bikes?

I had some Yumeya stuff back in the day.

https://www.bikeradar.com/news/just-in-shimano-yumeya-lightweight-kit/

For when XTR was just too utilitarian.

For current ones, I’m just setting off to bolt an obscene amount of titanium parts (inc a bashguard) to a steel hardtail.

Nowt. Goodrich brake lines? But the match the bike. Everything else has a function even the hope brakes. Shimano or Clarke would be as goodnow but i want rebuildability

I replaced all my zip ties with coloured coded ones*

Blue for gears, red for brakes, green for dropper.

I replaced all my zip ties with coloured coded ones*

Blue for gears, red for brakes, green for dropper.

I do that too. But black for gears, black for brakes and black for dropper. Then black for anything else.

I didn't need a Kashima Fox Transfer, but since Jared Graves was selling it for a lot less than retail, I couldn't resist.

Definitely the volume of oil slick to bolts in my stem and brakes/shifter mounts. Reminds me, I still want oil slick to rotor bolts but been holding out as they are already ti, just plain silver! 😂

+1 Bentley Components top caps

Orange Crivets for my Brooks saddle

I use Hope Head Doctor rather than a star-fangled-nut, the standard silver bolt was out of place, so was replaced with a black one.

Green cable ties to match the freehub seal on the Hope Pro4 hub. The one you can’t see when a cassette is fitted.

The Vans/ODI black checker lock-on grip collars that match the Stooge logo down tube decal.

Gold anodised bolts to hold the King Cage on.

Stainless cap head bolts for the stem and EBB.

The bottle cap bar end plugs with Iron Maiden Trooper beer caps. Different one each side from two of my favourite Iron Maiden songs.

Purple and gold dice valve caps to match the bikes colour scheme.

That’s just on one bike. I could go on.

Ti qr skewers on my steel gravel/cx bike. For weight saving obviously

Nothing is pointless exactly but I’ve spent way more than I needed to for little if any benefit. AXS gears and dropper, carbon rims, Hope bar.

Been very tempted by an anodised DUB preload adjuster though, only stopped because the pink is a bit bright…maybe

The pair of King Cage titanium bottle cages on my Gradient. But anything else would have been just wrong.

titanium bottle cage and matching titanium hipflask cage....mind you the custom ti bullmoose bars and pretty much the rest of the bike is pointlesly bling as singlespeeds were always meantto be a dirtbag throw togeather things not chariots of ego 🙂

replaced all bolts with titanium bolts. Like the oil slick

A 4.5k sworks tarmac frame. Rides exactly the same as any other decent road bike frame and given I don’t race will never notice the 40 seconds it’s meant to save me over 40 km

Was literally the only frame I could find in stock in medium however.

Not on the current bike but I’m sad when it comes to colour matching stuff. Replacing spacers with Hope silver ones so they match the hubs, stem etc. Utterly pointless as it adds nothing.

Hopefully a Ti bar on the current bike at some point as per the other thread. Can’t see it happening unless I find a used one. L

I confess to some minor oil slick parts.

Assuming all goes well tomorrow, an SC with a glovebox.

Lime green cables on my bike, pink on the Mrs, orange on the kids'.

What an outrageous thread. Bling is important. As important as life itself.

I had a set of WhiteIndustries ENO cranks that came on a bike, i fitted them to another. They're easily the best looking cranks ever made but then i did the maths and realised by oldschool blue LX cranks were equally as functional and the ebay value was more than i got the whole bike for.

Nothing is bling on my bikes

On mine it's a toss up between the Roost ti bar or the ti eeWings. Would probably have to pick the bars as the cranks clear the frame unlike Shimano ones.

I’d say probably the ti railed option I went for on my fabric scoop saddle, purely because it was the only one in stock in the black on black non colour way at the time. The irony is that it’s fitted to my on one hello dave, kitted out with domains and hope fortus 30’s with an insert and dh tyres!!! That bike weighs more than my fs enduro bike and certainly doesn’t warrant ti rails 😂

Oil slick ti bolts, but they're on my top tube so at least they're always visible.

Oil slick lezyne bottle cages, not even as good as the bottle cages they replaced and the oil slick finish flaked off in six months of mostly indoor use 😭

Anodised spoke nipples arranged in a patriotic Italian flag arrangement. They didn't actually cost any extra but I'm counting the extra build time it took me, and literally nobody ever commented on them and now I don't even use those wheels 🙄

Ritchey WCS on my road bikes

Equally guilty! Matchy matchy bars/stem/seatpost.

bigginge beat me to it 😂 . Otherwise is anodised Hope spacers, post-clamp and matching cable-ends 😳 In all fairnesw the full-build was a used purchase and am planning replacing as they wear-out-*

*So far one cable-end in three years and I reused that twice before it crumbled. My low tolerance for wastefulness messes with my fashion abilities

I have a bike that's permanently fitted to a turbo trainer. Its pedals have titanium axles.

New stickers for my pikes...

Old bike, Specialized Hard Rock, would have to have been the original hope mini brake up front. Cost almost 1/3 of the original bike price!

Edit: Oh and the SSG Bel-Air saddle in cow print with titanium rails. Did get it cheap at a bike show TBF.

I used to have an anodised purple chain tensioner on my GT Timberline (it was the mid-90s and that kind of shenanigans was acceptable)

Current one is a copper Knog Oi bell. It's shit but is pretty

Both my MTBs are really rather nice but both are completely lacking in bling. The closest are the (black) Hope floating rotors on one but as they’re old and from different eras so they don’t even match, I don’t think they count anymore!

My new Moxie gets noticed because it is pinker than a very pink thing and looks awesome but everything on it was chosen for function over bling, sorry. Lyrik Ultimate has shiny decals though.

I have to admit I'm struggling with this one. Where to start really.

I have a bike that’s permanently fitted to a turbo trainer. Its pedals have titanium axles.

I bought a road bike just to use on a wheel-off turbo trainer. It has never been on a road, in fact it hasn’t ever left my garage. I have no desire to ever ride a bike on the road. Yet I’ve bought better, more expensive tyres for it. Twice. Idiot.

After reading the replies I dont feel bad about spending £30 on two Ti shock bolts now

Dropper seatpost. Use it maybe once a ride.

I suppose it can come in handy when trying to fit the bike in the car though.

The fake dirt.

Anodised cable ferrules

I bought a carbon sram shifter clamp once, BK Composites, saved 12 grams

I bought XTR when it very first came out and realised to change chain,rings and cassette was over a weeks wages (didn't last great either). After that I just ran the bike as they came (only changing kit that annoyed/ wasn't up to job) which was not much really. Do buy droppers if the bike didn't come with one though.

Don't do bling really. Matching Thomson stem and seatpost on my ti tripster is about as far as it goes for me.

I tend to order Wolftooth bits when I've had a few beers. Some nice and functional (dropper trigger,  bar tape, cog), some just because they have the logo (stem cap, seatpost clamp, bottle cage)

Also, unnecessary anodised bolts on forks

That fork looks like a spotty teenager

I think braided brake hoses are definitely in the useless bling category. nice looking, adds nothing at all to the functionality and for extra bling points are actually harder to fit properly than the boggo black plastic hoses. If it actually makes your life harder for no real benefits other than it looks nice...that's dedication to the cause

I don't do bling says the poster with the frou -frou - hyper expensive for no real benefit - matchy matchy seat post and stem...

I think there are some folks in denial about their spending decisions.

Custom headbadge - pointless to anybody but me...

https://photos.app.goo.gl/fm4VX2mvPWqdyajZ7

Stopped to help some kids in Delamere today who looked like they were struggling with a stem bolt. Turns out they'd rounded it out while trying to remove it to change the black spacers for gold ones just purchased from the bike shop.

As the other one was still tight and the stem was secure on the steerer, suggested they'd probably be better doing it at home and not risk making worse in the middle of the woods.

Awesome teenager logic. 🤣🤣

Embarrassingly a full bike.

Bought a Lynskey built PX road bike, plumped for full Dura Ace pedals the lot. Zip carbon bar and stem, titanium and carbon wheel skewers, cut out seat clamp with titanium bolt etc. Got carried away with saving weight, unfortunately did all this before I realised road bikes weren't my thing, so if I round up its probably done 50 miles, so currently an expensive albeit shiny ornament and a reminder not to get too carried away.

Ti caliper bolts. PURPLE ti caliper bolts

£35 spent on ti saddle clamp bolts for my Magura Vyron seat post. Although the Ti top cap bolt might be more pointless ever so slightly, along with the carbon top cap it holds on. Replacing the rear cage plate on my AXS mech with a carbon one saved a whole 6g and cans really be seen let alone felt either.

Van Nicholas ti stem, Thomson ti flat bars, Torus TIF36 ti forks, ti layback seatpost - well it is on a Cotic Soda. I might have a bit of a ti fetish!

I've got one one of the titanium Chris King headsets on the DH bike I rarely use, a 2008 Stinky.
Because a normal CK one isn't blongy enough🙈
TBF I used it for the first time since before the plague last month by coming not quite last at the MacAvalanche. Maybe it would have been last if I had had to use just a normal headset

Probably the XTR rear mech on my YT. But it was bought second hand so I don't feel quite as bad.

Carbon Rocky Mountain bars on my Rocky Mountain. It came with perfectly good Race Face bars, but I was looking for some bars on ebay for another bike, saw these and had to have them. Really rather unnecessary, as is all the best bling.

Pointless - Fidlock bottle.
Bought purely for looks (although with the proviso that any bottle for that bike needs a usable cap over the mouthpiece)

Oil slick valve caps which cost a fiver.
That's it.
I never win anything.

I never win anything

You never know. You've spent money on something that performs worse than the part it replaced, heavier and likely to seize on. That's up there in the pointless stakes.

Dropper seatpost. Use it maybe once a ride.

Where/what are you riding? I use mine all the time, even at traffic lights!

Probably the XTR rear mech

My 2x10 29er came fitted with an XTR rear-mech. previous 2x10 29er had a mid-range Deore rear-mech. I find that the XTR one shifts faster and with more ease. It just feels smooth and sharp by comparison. I may be imagining it.

#eatmagicbeans

Dropper seatpost. Use it maybe once a ride.

Ditto. I'm more the urban cyclist tbh, so the dropper isn't really something i've used other than to make it easier to throw a leg over when mounting.

So off it comes to be replaced with the carbon USE post i got in their outlet sale.

Syncros 2.5 170mm dropper - 650 grams(inc remote)

USE Sumo carbon post - 240 grams.

14 1/2 ounce difference.

literally use my dropper every stop/start and every time the trail changes from down to up again...
Id even put one on my grave/road bike thing if it didnt mean sacrificing my ninja pump in the seatpost.. 😀

As for the tyres on the turbo trainer bike ^^^^ 😀

Reynolds blacklabel carbons. Noisey as hell freehub and feel no different to my Hunt XCs. Bought the reynolds for racing just as I was packing up racing.🙄